Wednesday, June 21, 2006

The 20th Hijacker

Apparently, the American media have been studiously avoiding giving this story anything much more than a crawl across the bottom of your TV screen, so let's go to the Beeb to find out more, shall we?
'Al-Qaeda video' of 20th hijacker

A video said to be from al-Qaeda shows the man it says was the planned "20th hijacker" for the 9/11 US attacks.
The video, released by a US intelligence organisation, is of Saudi man, Fawaz al-Nashimi, who was killed in a shootout in Saudi Arabia in 2004.

The US has not commented and the video claim cannot be independently verified.

The identity of a 20th hijacker has been the subject of great debate, although there is no concrete evidence one was part of the plans for 9/11.
What? Did we not just convict Moussaoui?
The CIA had initially suspected jailed al-Qaeda operative Zacarias Moussaoui as the 20th hijacker, but later revised its opinion.
Oh.
A statement said to be from al-Qaeda had appeared on a website on 13 June identifying Nashimi as the planned 20th hijacker.

It said that "for some reasons" alleged ringleader Mohammed Atta brought forward the date of the attacks and it was "not in Allah's design for [Nashimi] to become a martyr along with his 19 brothers".

The posting denied Moussaoui was the 20th hijacker, backing up an audio recording released in May purported to be from al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.

The man in the tape says: "I am the one in charge of the 19 brothers and I never assigned brother Zacarias to be with them in that mission."
I do have to wonder about one thing: this "IntelCenter" charges a pretty penny for what should essentially be a free video (after all, it's not like they produced it, did they?)